


He Wonders When He Forgot How to Laugh

by InlovewithStephenColbert



Category: Fake News RPF, Jon Stewart - Fandom, Stephen Colbert - Fandom, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, The Late Show with Stephen Colbert (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Dystopia, Death, Grief, Lots of wonderful people die, Prepare to have your heart broken, Stephen's POV mainly, Tragedy, im sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-22
Updated: 2016-11-22
Packaged: 2018-09-01 12:18:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,113
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8624203
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InlovewithStephenColbert/pseuds/InlovewithStephenColbert
Summary: "You cannot laugh and be afraid at the same time" - Stephen Colbert.Stephen stands on the roof of the Ed Sullivan and recalls how everything went so terribly wrong so terribly fast.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first work on the Archive and I hope you all enjoy this! Perhaps enjoy is the wrong word, I hope you all feel this, and understand where its coming from. Please leave a comment if you have a minute.  
> I apologize in advance for the lump in your throat.

He Wonders When He Forgot How to Laugh.

It started off slowly. They waited until the public outrage and consequent vigilance died down. One by one the greatest media houses started falling- either to their greed and ambition or to some (often fabricated) scandal. They moved so stealthily, so insidiously, that it took a long time for anyone to realize what was happening.

“Too long,” Stephen thought as he stared down at New York City from the roof of the Ed Sullivan Theatre, breathing in the crisp morning air and watching the sun rise over the buildings – blood red and fierce. ‘Blood has been spilt this night,’ he thought to himself smiling humorlessly at the city before him.

 

_Distantly, he could hear sirens._

 

Once they’d taken over the media, they ran stories that humanized the most radical members of the administration – _Get to Know so-and-so, Origins of a Leader, Guess who’s coming for dinner?_ – and lulled the public into a sense of complacency and passive agreement.

That’s when they struck, passing bill after bill at lightning speed through the senate- long winded and entrenched in political jargon that none of the media houses deciphered for the public because they’d been threatened (or paid) not to. The public never understood what was happening until it had already happened and never fathomed the implications until the laws they’d passed were implemented.

Suddenly liberal thinkers and leaders were pulled out of their beds and imprisoned or killed for ‘treason against the state’, members of the LGBT community were murdered on the streets, critics and analysts who dared to oppose them disappeared overnight and a new set of rules were imposed giving the government absolute power. Curfews were enforced, internet activity and phone lines were monitored, societies and groups that were suspected to oppose these changes were banned, people were given incentives to report on their friends and neighbors. Institutions that were looked upon unfavorably were buried in paperwork and permits, and prevented from functioning under a variety of excuses while those favored were allowed to flourish as long as they toed the government’s line.

People of color were lucky if they could get from home to office and back without getting attacked by supremacists who no longer had anything to fear- grocery shopping became a nightmare for most families. Slowly the attacks became more prominent, POCs were mugged, assaulted, murdered and the government – or as it now demanded to be called, the Regime, turned a blind eye. Borders were shut and almost all outgoing planes grounded, preventing citizens from leaving the country. Taxes were increased only on those sects of society the Regime regarded unfavorably.

Protests rose across the nation but after the first few massacres, they died down. The four-year mark came and went and nobody dared question why the elections weren’t held.

Nobody except them, and god what a price they had paid for it.

 

_The sirens were closer now, louder._

 

Jon had seen it first – naturally. He’d sat down to decode one of the earliest bills passed during one of his bouts of insomnia, and had been so horror struck at what he’d seen that he called Stephen immediately, at 2 am on a Monday night. Once what Jon had been trying to tell him had registered in his sleep-fogged brain, Stephen shot up in bed- alarmed, and dressed at lightning speed, barely stopping to leave a note for Evie before he drove to Jon’s house at breakneck speeds. Stephen could still remember sitting with Jon at the kitchen table nursing an untouched beer and staring at the bill in front of them in sheer terror.

The right to protest was guaranteed by the First Amendment.

The Regime’s right to quash a protest using any means they deemed fit was guaranteed by the bill in front of them.

They spent the rest of the night mapping out their plans for the future and when Stephen returned home the next morning, he walked into the sight of his wife singing as she made breakfast, and his children squabbling at the table, their laughter echoing through his home.

“Daddy?” Madeline’s voice cut through the haze that had engulfed him. Blinking as he stared at the concerned faces of his family it was all he could do to not burst into tears.

 

A month later they passed the next bill- restricting the level to which the public could gain information about and question the actions of the government. Two days later, Evelyn, Stephen’s three children, Tracey, and Jon’s two kids boarded a plane to Australia- one of the few countries that had openly condemned the Regime’s actions. Stephen could still remember the warmth of his wife as she hugged him, the smell of his daughter’s hair, his youngest son’s tears and the grim look of determination on his eldest son’s face.

On the drive back to the apartment they would now be sharing (Jon and Stephen had quietly liquefied all their assets and had sent all their wealth with their families; they wouldn’t need it anymore), Jon broke down in the passenger seat. Stephen pulled over and tugged him into his arms, allowing his closest friend to weep for his family, his home, his nation.

 

_The sirens were a lot louder now. A couple of blocks away at best._

 

Slowly all their friends followed their lead. John Oliver sent his son to his mother in England, his wife refused to leave him. Steve Carell moved to Canada with his family, and after tons of arguing, Stephen convinced Paul to take his family and move to Australia and keep an eye on his and Jon’s families.

A month after Stephen had said goodbye to his family and friends, the borders were shut.

As America slowly grew more and more silent, they raised their voices.  The entire system had been corrupted and the only sources of true news were the so-called ‘comedians’ and late night TV hosts.

Unfortunately, as the people began realizing this, so too did the Regime.

The two Jimmy’s were the first to be imprisoned, for calling the government out for not holding the elections.

Seth was next, shot to death on air when he condemned the Regime for not investigating the murders of hundreds of POCs and LGBTs in Indiana.

Sam Bee was killed on camera as Jason struggled to get to her- fighting against four cops to reach his wife until finally one of them had had enough and shot him too.

They killed John Oliver and his wife as he stood at one of the earliest protests against the regime. The only reason anyone knew was because Stephen and Jon had trampled through all the dead bodies until they’d found him, Kate’s hand held firmly within his.  That night Stephen held Jon as he sobbed himself to sleep, and somewhere deep down Stephen had realized that he’d probably never see his family ever again. Burying his face in Jon’s hair he tried to hope. Hope and pray.

Despite the loss of all their friends, Stephen kept talking to the nation every night on his show and Jon kept reaching out to people who needed their help and tried to help them out of the country through his many allies in Washington and across the nation. Every night he survived, every night Stephen came back to the apartment they shared, unharmed and safe for another day, Jon and Stephen celebrated with a beer and comfortable silence, reveling in the companionship and support they gave each other.

 Until one night Stephen returned to a cold home and saw that they’d killed Jon – as a ‘warning’ to him. He’d lost it then, destroyed their home in a fit of fury and sorrow before he collapsed next to Jon and cradled his best friend’s cold dead body in his arms and wept. Wept for his friend, for Jon who was so much more to him than words could ever say. When he finally got up it was morning, his shirt and his hands were stained with blood, and he knew that he’d probably never forget the sight of Jon’s lifeless blue eyes.

That had been a week ago.

Stephen had called his wife and his kids and quietly said his goodbyes to them. He told Tracey what had happened and how sorry he was for it, feeling utterly useless as she broke down over the line. Moments later he could hear Evie comfort her.

“Come here Stephen.” She had begged him. He kept the phone before he did something stupid.

When the phone rang moments later, he didn’t pick up.

 

_The sirens were deafeningly loud now, right under the theatre._

 

The whole of last week, Stephen had put up some of his most outspoken shows. The nation had cried with him when he told them of Jon’s death. The viewership was the highest ever and he liked to think that his last five shows would make a difference, that they’d help someone to stand up for what was right, would make someone hope.

He wouldn’t be doing any more.

 

Yesterday, he’d received a call from one of Jon’s friends in Washington who told him that the Regime had had enough and that it was time for him to leave. He said he wasn’t going anywhere and that they could come and get him. There was a pause on the line before the man said, “You and Jon are more alike than you know”, and Stephen’s heart stopped. Their goodbye was short, the one he said on his show (covertly of course, no need to let the Regime know that he knew) was not. He went home after his last show (not that any of his crew knew) after personally thanking everyone and telling them to never lose hope. When he reached the apartment, he collapsed onto his bed and thought of his last day with Jon, and Jon’s strange insistence that they drive across town to eat a particular brand of ice cream and laughed and laughed until he cried (but was it really laughter when his throat was burning and every choked sound that escaped him threatened to engulf him in a wave of misery and hysteria and he felt like a madman laughing at his own destruction? Laughing because he didn’t know how else to force himself to feel anything but fear?).

 

_The sirens had finally stopped._

 

Stephen took a deep breath and looked out at New York City, his city. His city that had lost more than half its population and all its glory. Manhattan was practically a ghost town and Brooklyn was a wasteland.

 

Behind him the door banged open and Stephen heard multiple footsteps run out and surround him. Turning his head slightly, he saw there were about eight cops around him and felt strangely honored they thought he was worth those many.

 

Looking back at his city one last time, he thought of Chicago, of Charleston. He thought of his father, his mother, his siblings, his childhood.

“Sir I need you to turn around.” The officers’ voice was robotic and Stephen wondered how many times the man had done this as he turned around.

Looking at the officers properly, he vaguely recognized one of them as a fan and offered him a half-smile. The man choked off a sob before running out the door- his partner following. The remaining officers shuffled uncomfortably until one of them finally pointed a gun at him.

 

Looking past the barrel of the gun aimed at him, Stephen looked at the man holding it and remembered Jon’s long impassioned speeches on gun violence, he remembered laughing with Steve and teasing John. He remembered the last year he spent living with Jon and Paul’s antics back when they were shooting Strangers with Candy.

He remembers chasing his daughter around the neighbourhood park back when she barely came up to mid-thigh, and swinging her high up into his arms. He remembers reading his youngest son a bedtime story the night before his family left. He remembers teaching his eldest how to play baseball and dodging as the bat went flying out of his tiny hands. He remembers kissing his wife on their wedding day and Jon’s pale blue eyes alight with laughter as they stumbled out of the Daily Show’s studio. He remembers endless chants of “Stephen! Stephen!”

His last thought is of pale blue eyes staring into nothing, their owner lying cold and dead in a pool of his own blood and Stephen’s hands sticky and red in that same liquid, and closes his eyes, wondering when exactly he forgot how to laugh.

 

_The gun fires._

 

 

                                                


End file.
